Why are you assuming the flying saucers are extra-terrestrial? Bits of humanity are perfectly capable of attacking other bits of humanity with the shiniest fanciest thing they can get their hands on, and I don't expect that to change in the next 15 million years, even if we do finally develop flying saucers by then...

Unstoppable force of nature. That means she/her/hers.Has committed an act of treason.

Echo244 wrote:Why are you assuming the flying saucers are extra-terrestrial? Bits of humanity are perfectly capable of attacking other bits of humanity with the shiniest fanciest thing they can get their hands on, and I don't expect that to change in the next 15 million years, even if we do finally develop flying saucers by then...

It's actually three million years, right? Each box is (unit) later from the previous, starting with Today, and the five boxes are the five times chosen? (Destruction of Earth by the sun would be only three billion years out by that model, but.)

So much depends upon a red wheel barrow (>= XXII) but it is not going to be installed.

Echo244 wrote:Why are you assuming the flying saucers are extra-terrestrial? Bits of humanity are perfectly capable of attacking other bits of humanity with the shiniest fanciest thing they can get their hands on, and I don't expect that to change in the next 15 million years, even if we do finally develop flying saucers by then...

I can't really see us getting away from cylindrical/triangular aircraft/spacecraft. I don't know why, but perfectly circular craft don't seem human to me.

I'm alive because the cats are alive.The cats are alive because I'm alive.Specious.

Echo244 wrote:Why are you assuming the flying saucers are extra-terrestrial? Bits of humanity are perfectly capable of attacking other bits of humanity with the shiniest fanciest thing they can get their hands on, and I don't expect that to change in the next 15 million years, even if we do finally develop flying saucers by then...

I can't really see us getting away from cylindrical/triangular aircraft/spacecraft. I don't know why, but perfectly circular craft don't seem human to me.

Echo244 wrote:Why are you assuming the flying saucers are extra-terrestrial? Bits of humanity are perfectly capable of attacking other bits of humanity with the shiniest fanciest thing they can get their hands on, and I don't expect that to change in the next 15 million years, even if we do finally develop flying saucers by then...

It's actually three million years, right? Each box is (unit) later from the previous, starting with Today, and the five boxes are the five times chosen? (Destruction of Earth by the sun would be only three billion years out by that model, but.)

True. Only three million years to wait, then.

Anyway, perfectly disc-shaped craft might be designed at some point. If we ever reach the point where we've got enough lift ability to get pretty much anything to function as an aircraft/spaceship, why not design things to look like all the spaceships from retro-science-fiction?

Unstoppable force of nature. That means she/her/hers.Has committed an act of treason.

Stotherd wrote:If humanity is still using Fahrenheit at all by then, we deserve to be destroyed.

It would have been amusing if the last panel of the 5-year forecast was in Celsius.

My thought was that in that line, the 2nd should have a C after the number, the 3rd and 4th should have random other letters, and the 5th should use a totally strange writing system. But your suggestion is just as funny, and probably more accurate in whatever the US is called then.

Echo244 wrote:Why are you assuming the flying saucers are extra-terrestrial? Bits of humanity are perfectly capable of attacking other bits of humanity with the shiniest fanciest thing they can get their hands on, and I don't expect that to change in the next 15 million years, even if we do finally develop flying saucers by then...

It's actually three million years, right? Each box is (unit) later from the previous, starting with Today, and the five boxes are the five times chosen? (Destruction of Earth by the sun would be only three billion years out by that model, but.)

True. Only three million years to wait, then.

Anyway, perfectly disc-shaped craft might be designed at some point. If we ever reach the point where we've got enough lift ability to get pretty much anything to function as an aircraft/spaceship, why not design things to look like all the spaceships from retro-science-fiction?

I hope we have an art deco future based on the stylings of the Chrysler Atlantique.

I'm alive because the cats are alive.The cats are alive because I'm alive.Specious.

cellocgw wrote:Just dropping by to say Hey! What's with the sig figs in square (4,4) ?

And btw does anyone really believe the 5-day forecasts we get now? The fifth day is dang near to being wrong more than 50% of the time.

Shirley you meant (5,4)?

I trust the forecast 3 days out, and I certainly look at day 4 & 5 but never trust them. Despite the supercomputers used by NWS, they're more often than not just plain wrong. I tend to notice more than most, since I'm responsible for planning (and canceling) astronomy events for our club. [/rant]

And while we're on the topic ... a wise meteorologist once told me: If you always predicted tomorrow's weather would be the same as today's you'd be correct about 80% of the time. [citation needed, as I never really checked that, but it sounds about right]

Stotherd wrote:If humanity is still using Fahrenheit at all by then, we deserve to be destroyed.

Fahrenheit is perfectly viable for measuring ambient weather temperatures. The 0 and 100 are actually useful in that situation, with 0 being very cold, while 100 is very hot. Both require extra precautions but are completely survivable. Compare Celsius where 0 is a bit chilly and 100 is near-instantly lethal. Not as much granularity in the measurements either, with less than a 50 degree spread of commonly useful numbers and entire seasons of less than 10 degree variation.

Stotherd wrote:If humanity is still using Fahrenheit at all by then, we deserve to be destroyed.

Fahrenheit is perfectly viable for measuring ambient weather temperatures. The 0 and 100 are actually useful in that situation, with 0 being very cold, while 100 is very hot. Both require extra precautions but are completely survivable. Compare Celsius where 0 is a bit chilly and 100 is near-instantly lethal. Not as much granularity in the measurements either, with less than a 50 degree spread of commonly useful numbers and entire seasons of less than 10 degree variation.

Alternatively: -10 Celsius is cold, 0 is chilly, 10 is cool, 20 is warm, 30 is hot, and 40 is survivable but requires precautions, and a difference of 1 degree is just about noticeable. Single digit temperatures are routine, and you never need more than two digits. For temperatures in Fahrenheit, you have to allow for a third digit, and desirable ambient temperatures are up in a range where numbers are getting fairly abstract, rather than being definite things. Does anyone notice the difference between 82 and 83?

We already have a superior temperature scale. From the depths of hell last year, I humbly present you:

SCSimmons wrote:Fiddled around with possibilities for a bit. I thought milli-electron volts per molecule (of an ideal perfect gas) looked pretty handy for everyday purposes. The unit turns out to be just under 8ºC and almost exactly 14ºF, so it's not very fine-grained; reporting to tenths of a degree [sic] would give you comparable precision to what you see in weather forecasts, but the comfort categories can be that wide & still work well. I'll call this unit the Maxwell ºM [sic]; he got a nice law named after him, but as far as I know, never a unit, the poor guy.

Water freezes at 35.2ºM [sic] and boils at 48.1ºM [sic] at standard pressure. And normal human body temperature is ... hold on, I know 98.6 ºF is an outdated rule of thumb, let me look up the real number & variance ...

35M is cold, 36M is chilly, high 37 through 38M is acceptable, 39M is a beach party, 40M is damn hot (and his/her body temperature).

For Canadians and Russians: 34M is chilly, 35M is acceptable, 36M is warm, 37M and above is damn hot.For Mexicans and Australians: 37M and below is cold, 38M is chilly, 39M and 40M is acceptable and 41M is warm.

Could be, if zero for Celsius didn't have that convenient (and very important) meaning that "the water is freezing".

The trouble is that that's laboratory water. Outdoors the water will probably not freeze because of sunlight and particles in the water.And it can snow at temperatures well above freezing, but you can only enjoy it for more than 2 seconds if it's well below freezing. (We dutch have to deal with that nearly every year. )

Agreed. Stuff like the height of a giraffe, the mass of a velociraptor, the electron flow through my house, and capacity of my hard drive are only very poorly approximated in degrees Fahrenheit.

Kit. wrote:Could be, if zero for Celsius didn't have that convenient (and very important) meaning that "the water is freezing".

Zero for Farenheit has the convenient (and very important, at least where I live) meaning that "salt won't make any difference".

Jose

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